Dragon Blaster Skeletor Revealed

June 6, 2012 | Poe

I’m not even gonna bother with the spoiler stuff.

I’m sad to say I’m disappointed. I was expecting something a bit more realistic (and an articulated jaw, which I would have taken over a ball-jointed neck). It’s not that different from the vintage version.

Look, it’s one thing to not go all hog-wild with “anime hyper detail,” but couldn’t we make it at least look a bit less like Goal Eater? Maybe it’ll look better when we get more photos of it. It’s hard to tell how detailed the body is. But I’m not a fan of that head.

I don’t know, maybe I’m being hypocritical what with my support of the style of this line, but I feel like they could have made it a bit more detailed and gotten away with it. (more…)

Interview > Bluefin Tamashii Nations USA

June 4, 2012 | Poe

As many of you know, I’m pretty excited about the S.H.MonsterArts line. That line is being brought to the U.S. by Bluefin Distribution, who have a fairly active presence on Facebook. Bluefin’s Xavier Lim was kind enough to answer a few questions about the company and the brands it distributes.

1.) Many Western collectors are unfamiliar with Bluefin Tamashii Nations USA. Can you briefly describe the company and its connection to Bandai? (Side question: what’s the “Bluefin” about?)

Bluefin Distribution is an official U.S. distributor for 2 branches of Bandai Japan: Bandai Collectors, known as Tamashii Nations, and Bandai Hobby, the division that produces Gundam-related model kits. The “Bluefin” is a reference to the bluefin tuna. (more…)

Interview > James Chillcott of ShelfLifex.com

June 1, 2012 | Poe

When you run a toy-oriented website (or any website, really) with a respectable amount of traffic, you eventually start to receive unsolicited emails. Most of the time they’re either unrelated to the topic of the website, press releases, or just boring. Once in a while, though, I receive an email that intrigues me and I think merits further investigation.

A few months back I got an email from the folks at ShelfLife (www.shelflifex.com), a new website whose three stated goals are:

  1. To create a free encyclopedia of every collectible ever made
  2. To provide the best collection management tools, community features and collectibles news aggregation yet seen
  3. To make Ebay useless to collectors by launching a next generation marketplace that blows that old tech away

Lofty goals, of course, and time will tell successful they are at reaching them. But I visited the site out of curiosity and found something that had been lacking in my previous test-drives of similar sites: an easy-to-use, intuitive interface.

I wrote back to ShelfLife CEO James Chillcott to find out more about the project. (more…)

BBTS has Takara Masterpiece, New Hasbro Marvel, SW, Joe, TF, Dark Knight, MIB III & More

May 31, 2012 | Poe

We’ve just dropped pricing on three new Masterpiece offerings from Takara – MP-12 Sideswipe ($83.99), MP-12 Red Alert ($83.99), MP-13 Soundwave ($139.99) and have posted this on our site

Attention Transformers Customers – BBTS ‘Thank You’ Preorder Price Cut

We appreciate your patronage and want to thank all our valued Transformers customers by offering a special preorder discount on these items! Transformers and Transformer customers have been a key part of BBTS since inception in 1999! If it’s been a while since you’ve purchased from BBTS, we want you back! If you’ve never shopped with us before, give us a try – we won’t let you down! Our Pile of Loot, Secure Shopping, No-Strings-Attached Preorders, Gigantic Selection, Vintage Department, Collector Grade, Protective Packaging, and Superior Service make BBTS the #1 destination for collectors.

MP-13 Soundwave – $139.99

MP-12 Sideswipe – $83.99

MP-12 Red Alert – $83.99

Dark Knight Rises product is now officially ready for live sales online – check out our menu here – 65 items up for order now, more will be added as vendors release information.

Men In Black III – Standard Issue Sidearm Replica

McFarlane Dark Knight Sports Picks – Hines Ward – Gotham Rogues

Dark Knight Rises Film Cells – 12 cool items

Hasbro has just released an impressive list of new products:

Star Wars Vintage Figures – Wave 04 – This wave features 6 new figures each with a normal version of the packaging as well as a new promotional blue card version. Cases, Sets, and Singles are available here:

Marvel Universe 2012 – Wave 01 – This wave contains Spider-Man Unlimited, Kraven, New Incredible Hulk, Beast, and Beta Ray Bill – available by the case or set

Transformers Prime Deluxe – Waves 05 and 06 – Wave 05 features Ironhide and Rumble, Wave 06 features a nice mix of desirable new and older figures – all in some sort of new or promotional style packaging

GI Joe Retaliation – Wave 03 Figures – 5 new figures plus a set of wave 2 figures in this case

Star Wars Clone Wars (more…)